55 Russell Street, South Brisbane

Premis was engaged under a Design and Construct contract to refurbish an existing vacant tenancy for a confidential government health client.

The purpose of the refurbishment was to accommodate the client’s office-based staff, who needed to relocate due to space constraints in their current workplace. Although there was already an existing fit-out in place, it didn’t meet or suit the client’s needs or requirements with significant sections of the space needing to be re-worked to make it functional. 

In order to ensure the new tenancy accommodated the client’s staff relocation, design and construction works were undertaken on the existing space to make it fit-for-purpose and fully operational within the short timeframe available.

The majority of the existing fit-out was demolished, including walls, flooring and joinery. These spaces were prepped for refurbishment, before new offices and workstations were built along one side of the tenancy. One of the existing rooms had two entrances, one of them through the existing kitchen. This entrance was removed, replaced with a solid wall and the new room was refurbished to become a client call centre.

One of the existing rooms was also refurbished to create a ‘wellness room’ for female staff. This enabled mothers to express milk and breastfeed their babies in privacy while at work.

The building services required extensive alterations all while maintaining the integrity of the existing incipient fire rated ceiling located under the roofline. The existing air conditioning system needed to be upgraded and redesigned to accommodate the additional heat load due to the new staff numbers occupying the space. New air conditioning units were installed and adjustments made to the base building unit to facilitate this new design. The existing lighting was also removed and replaced with new efficient and environmentally friendly LED lights.

The existing data cabling in the tenancy also required removal, and was fully replaced in order to meet the new cabling standards required for the client’s specific needs. This component of the works presented the biggest challenge with over 500 data outlets needing the be terminated and tested over a two day period of time.

A strict deadline of five weeks was required for the entire project, with no scope for delays or extensions of time being granted. This was because the client’s move-in date was static, as they were vacating their existing tenancy to make way for other occupants to move in. 

Premis’s extensive experience in delivering quick turnaround projects is achieved by following their trusted processes in design, planning, procurement, and delivery. The Refurbishment was completed successfully and on time. The result was a bright, modern, fully functioning working environment ready for staff to commence work in straight away!